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Electronics Repair(sci.electronics.repair) Discussion of repairing electronic equipment. Topics include requests for assistance, where to obtain servicing information and parts, techniques for diagnosis and repair, and annecdotes about success, failures and problems.

On 12/5/2017 12:05 PM, MOP CAP wrote:
I have looked on ebay and amazon for these. There is a plethora of
choices and confusing.
Has anyone had experience with any suppliers?
Thanks,
CP

Keep a watch at Ace Hardware.
They had the drill with battery for $30 and half off that around BF.
'tis the season for tool battery deals.

Batteries are a crap shoot. Aftermarket batteries seem to get good
initial reviews, then later, lots of complaints that they don't last long.
Can't trust the 'shill' reviews.
I decided to stick with real vendor batteries on sale at local
retailers.

I also retired all my old B&D crap and craftsman crap and skill crap
and the box of dead batteries and the box of chargers and and
and and switched to Ryobi lithium. They're transitioning to
brushless and having some good deals on packages of brushed motor tools.
And Ryobi shows up a lot at garage sales and thrift stores for dirt
cheap. If you use tools for business, may want to go with a better
brand, but for homeowner use, they're fine.

I really like the ability to swap batteries between generations
of tools. And lithium has the great advantage that it's not dead
every time you want to use it. NiCd self discharge is a bitch
for tools you don't use every day.

On Wednesday, 6 December 2017 08:04:05 UTC, mike wrote:
On 12/5/2017 12:05 PM, MOP CAP wrote:
I have looked on ebay and amazon for these. There is a plethora of
choices and confusing.
Has anyone had experience with any suppliers?
Thanks,
CP

Keep a watch at Ace Hardware.
They had the drill with battery for $30 and half off that around BF.
'tis the season for tool battery deals.

Batteries are a crap shoot. Aftermarket batteries seem to get good
initial reviews, then later, lots of complaints that they don't last long.
Can't trust the 'shill' reviews.
I decided to stick with real vendor batteries on sale at local
retailers.

I also retired all my old B&D crap and craftsman crap and skill crap
and the box of dead batteries and the box of chargers and and
and and switched to Ryobi lithium. They're transitioning to
brushless and having some good deals on packages of brushed motor tools.
And Ryobi shows up a lot at garage sales and thrift stores for dirt
cheap. If you use tools for business, may want to go with a better
brand, but for homeowner use, they're fine.

I really like the ability to swap batteries between generations
of tools. And lithium has the great advantage that it's not dead
every time you want to use it. NiCd self discharge is a bitch
for tools you don't use every day.

I pulled out a lithium cordless tool the other day that hadn't been used in years. Pressed the trigger and to my surprise it ran.

20 years ago, Ryobi closed all their parts warehouses
in the US.
Secondly, for example, if you blow the gear box in a
Makita, you order a complete new gearbox.
With Ryobi, you get to order each part individually and
assemble it yourself.

20 years ago, Ryobi closed all their parts warehouses
in the US.
Secondly, for example, if you blow the gear box in a
Makita, you order a complete new gearbox.
With Ryobi, you get to order each part individually and
assemble it yourself.

Yeah, I did this for a living for a while.

Like I said, if you use 'em to make a living, you might
want something better.

I've been buying tools of many brands at garage sales and thrift stores.
In 40 years of household use I've never broken a cordless tool.
It's always the batteries that go dead.

So, you end up with a Makita drill with a dead battery and a good
battery for a B&D drill you don't have and a similar B&D drill
that won't fit that battery. And a Porter Cable battery with no tool.
and a big box of perfectly good tools that need batteries.
And a 'toxic waste dump' of random dead batteries.

Any 18V Ryobi tool I have works on any Ryobi 18V NiCD or lithium
battery I have.
Yesterday, I bought a Ryobi 18V drill at a thrift store for $2.50.
Works great with a lithium battery pack.
I bought the $1.50 light and replaced the incandescent with LED.
And the second $1.50 light is gonna get turned into a 120VAC supply.
Not sure what I'm gonna do with the 3rd $1.50 light, I got carried away.
I passed on the $3 circular saw because I already
have more of those than I need.

Ryobi is the sweet spot for "good enough" tools cheaper than dirt,
available everywhere.
We don't need no stinkin' repair parts. ;-)

20 years ago, Ryobi closed all their parts warehouses
in the US.
Secondly, for example, if you blow the gear box in a
Makita, you order a complete new gearbox.
With Ryobi, you get to order each part individually and
assemble it yourself.

Yeah, I did this for a living for a while.

Like I said, if you use 'em to make a living, you might
want something better.

I've been buying tools of many brands at garage sales and thrift stores.
In 40 years of household use I've never broken a cordless tool.
It's always the batteries that go dead.

So, you end up with a Makita drill with a dead battery and a good
battery for a B&D drill you don't have and a similar B&D drill
that won't fit that battery. And a Porter Cable battery with no tool.
and a big box of perfectly good tools that need batteries.
And a 'toxic waste dump' of random dead batteries.

Any 18V Ryobi tool I have works on any Ryobi 18V NiCD or lithium
battery I have.
Yesterday, I bought a Ryobi 18V drill at a thrift store for $2.50.
Works great with a lithium battery pack.
I bought the $1.50 light and replaced the incandescent with LED.
And the second $1.50 light is gonna get turned into a 120VAC supply.
Not sure what I'm gonna do with the 3rd $1.50 light, I got carried away.
I passed on the $3 circular saw because I already
have more of those than I need.

Ryobi is the sweet spot for "good enough" tools cheaper than dirt,
available everywhere.
We don't need no stinkin' repair parts. ;-)

Take the NiCd cells out of the unuseful packs & recell the wanted ones

20 years ago, Ryobi closed all their parts warehouses
in the US.
Secondly, for example, if you blow the gear box in a
Makita, you order a complete new gearbox.
With Ryobi, you get to order each part individually and
assemble it yourself.

Yeah, I did this for a living for a while.

Like I said, if you use 'em to make a living, you might
want something better.

I've been buying tools of many brands at garage sales and thrift stores.
In 40 years of household use I've never broken a cordless tool.
It's always the batteries that go dead.

So, you end up with a Makita drill with a dead battery and a good
battery for a B&D drill you don't have and a similar B&D drill
that won't fit that battery. And a Porter Cable battery with no tool.
and a big box of perfectly good tools that need batteries.
And a 'toxic waste dump' of random dead batteries.

Any 18V Ryobi tool I have works on any Ryobi 18V NiCD or lithium
battery I have.
Yesterday, I bought a Ryobi 18V drill at a thrift store for $2.50.
Works great with a lithium battery pack.
I bought the $1.50 light and replaced the incandescent with LED.
And the second $1.50 light is gonna get turned into a 120VAC supply.
Not sure what I'm gonna do with the 3rd $1.50 light, I got carried away.
I passed on the $3 circular saw because I already
have more of those than I need.

Ryobi is the sweet spot for "good enough" tools cheaper than dirt,
available everywhere.
We don't need no stinkin' repair parts. ;-)

Take the NiCd cells out of the unuseful packs & recell the wanted ones

NT

One problem is that all the wanted ones have more cells than the
not-yet-completely-dead packs.

I've tried rebuilds on multiple occasions.
Problem is that if one cell is dead, the others aren't far behind.
I have computer controlled power supply and loads that I've used to
try to match used cells. Best you can hope for is matched crappy
performance. Most often encountered symptom is at least one cell
that works just fine after you charge it, but self discharge takes
it to zero in a few days.

Problem with tool batteries is reverse charge.
You're drilling along and the drill starts to slow down.
Well, you've only got two more holes to drill, so you do it.
Now, you have at least one reversed cell. And it gets worse
every time you do it. When a cell is damaged it's capacity is
lower, so it's the one that gets reversed again next time.

Tool batteries are overcharged, overheated, over discharged, vented,
left unused for years. By the time you need em, they've self discharged
and some cells are likely shorted, which means the others get
overcharged and vent.

You find that a new battery cost about as much as a new tool set.
Then the tool sits in the basement until you decide to clean up
and sell it at a garage sale or give it to Goodwill.

I've bought a lot of used tool batteries. They are almost never good,
And new cells cost about as much as a new battery.

Much of this can be avoided by paying attention and taking care of
your batteries. But 99.9% of the people don't know, don't care.
That's why they go bad and you find a dead cordless tool at virtually
every garage sale. People who take care of their tools don't sell
em for 25-cents at their garage sale.

I've always thought 12v & 14.4v ones could be run off a car battery or a small SLA sat on the floor. But really no-one is that short of dough these days.

On Thursday, December 7, 2017 at 1:53:34 PM UTC-5, mike wrote:
Unfortunately, the pack-rat in me can't bear to let go of all the
old, useless cordless tools. ;-(

I have used Craig's List CURB ALERT quite often to creatively recycle many things from (no kidding) old toilets to picked-over electronics to random junk. I can honestly state that nothing has lasted more than four days - or the first weekend, whichever comes first. I know now to initiate such alerts on Thursdays. A careful, but accurate description with pictures often helps.

The stuff gets gone, and as someone went to the trouble of coming to get it - I suspect that it will actually get used. Far better than a paper sign "FREE".